-The Republican Party has decided that its path
back to power is complete and total fealty to Donald Trump,
and they're purging anyone who refuses to repeat his lies
about the 2020 election,
no matter how destructive it is for the country.
For more on this, it's time for A Closer Look.
♪♪
It is exceedingly rare in the history of this country
for a political party to stay so closely tied
to an ex-president,
let alone one who is as deeply unpopular as Donald Trump.
What we're seeing right now in the Republican Party
is not usually how the process unfolds
after a party loses power, especially in a landslide,
amid a once-in-a-century cataclysm.
And let's remember, the GOP didn't just lose,
they got wiped out. They lost the presidency
and both houses of Congress.
Trump never once cracked 50 percent job approval
and never won the popular vote.
Meanwhile, President Biden is riding high with a 63 percent
approval ratings in a new poll out today.
The GOP is treating Trump like a good luck charm
even after he brought them terrible luck.
If the first time Dumbo tried to fly,
he plummeted to the ground and broke all four legs
and both ears, he would have let go of the feather.
And yet the GOP is still fully enthralled to Trump,
who oversaw the worst economic crash and unemployment crisis
in a century, rising poverty and child hunger,
and a disastrous pandemic response
that left hundreds of thousands of Americans dead.
Not to mention that violent insurrection where he incited
a mountain of rioters to ransack the Capitol
and disrupt the lawful counting of electoral votes.
You remember that? Somehow it feels like it
was approximately 800 years ago
when in reality it happened in January.
Now Trump's shuffling around his golf course
like it never happened, popping up in photos
like a retired bigfoot and interrupting weddings
and other private events to drone on
about his deranged belief
that he actually won the election.
-The former president himself is still waxing poetic
about finding irregularities right around the corner,
apparently living in an alternate reality
down at Mar-a-Lago.
-Watch Arizona, some very interesting things
are happening in Arizona, right? You know about that.
And we just had a great ruling or actually the Senate
the State Senate of Arizona.
Let's see what they find, I wouldn't be surprised
if they found thousands
and thousands and thousands of votes.
So we're going to watch that very closely.
And after that you'll watch Pennsylvania
you'll watch Georgia, and you're going to watch
Michigan and Wisconsin. We get 75 million votes.
Nobody's ever gotten that.
They said, "Get 66 million votes, sir.
And the election's over," well, I got 75 million.
And they said -- well, you saw what happened.
10:30 in the evening all of a sudden they said
"That's a strange thing.
Why are they closing up certain place?"
A lot of things happening right now.
I just want to say it's an honor to be here.
It's an honor to have you at Mar-a-Lago.
You are a great and beautiful couple.
-In fairness to Trump, it's very hard
to do stand up comedy when you're opening for a band.
I mean, he's just going from room to room at Mar-a-Lago,
interrupting the most sacred moments
in people's lives to whine about his election loss.
Like Bill Murray with a head injury.
[ As Trump ] You're going to find thousands of votes
in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Arizona. A lot of things are
happening with the mail ballots and the signature matches.
I said you got to get the signatures.
And they say, "Sir, we can't, sir."
And I say "That's. That's a strange thing, isn't it?
Anyway, enjoy the bris.
Let me know if you need a mohel.
I got a guy so good, so good. He also cuts Rudy's hair."
[ Normal voice ] Although I'm guessing
if you hold a wedding reception at Mar-a-Lago
at this point, you're counting on Trump popping in.
It's like having a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese.
The rat better be there or there's going to be hell to pay.
"What do you mean it's Chuck's days off?"
"Well, technically, he's in the shop
because he had a mechanical error
that made it look like he was giving kids a middle finger.
But they like tell him he has the day off."
"what am I supposed to tell my son whose birthday it is
and he was dying to meet Chuck E. Cheese?"
"You could tell him Jasper T. Jowls is still here."
"Nobody likes Jasper T. Jowls!"
"Also, sometimes Donald Trump rolls through and complains
about Brad Raffensperger."
And by the way, that insane Arizona audit
he referenced is the same one you may have heard where
Republicans are reportedly searching for bamboo on ballots
to find out if they were smuggled in from Asia.
-The other day at the press conference,
you were talking about bamboo. What was that about?
-Well, is that there's accusations of 40,000 ballots
were flown in. -To Arizona?
-To Arizona, and it was stuffed into the box, okay?
And it came from the southeast part of the world, Asia, okay.
And and what they're doing is to find out
if there's bamboo in the paper. That camera right there
that they take a picture of the ballot.
If you -- they can really look at depth and find out,
is it a hand-marked paper ballot because it's a 5k camera.
-And why do you check for bamboo?
-Because they use bamboo in their paper processing,
-Who's they? -People in Southeast Asia.
-They're using a 5k camera to find out
if there's bamboo in the paper
to see if the ballots came from Southeast Asia.
Imagine going to Best Buy to get the camera and explaining.
That's what it's for.
"Are you looking for something for your family photos
or something more professional?" "Well, I'm looking for something
that can detect strands of bamboo on ballots.
Why are you calling store security?
Is that bamboo in your shirt?
Guys? They're on to me. Oh, damn it.
Um, do you also have those, like, secret wrist microphones?"
Also, what a waste of a 5k camera.
This is an actual television show,
and I'm pretty sure we have, at best, 1.5k's.
I don't even know what the "K" in 5k stands for.
I tried to find out, but whenever I asked,
my crew tells me it stands for
"It's none of your [Bleep] business, 'kay."
[ Laughter ]
When I was in my attic during quarantine,
I had to film myself on my own iPad
because NBC refused to send actual TV cameras to my house.
They said a 5k camera would be wasted
on bits about "The Thornburgs,"
a magic door, and the wasps I befriended.
And they definitely did not like the sea captain.
The programing execs sat me down and said to me,
And this is true, "Why won't the sea captain work for a dolphin?"
And I said, "Why?"
And they said, "Because he serves no porpoise."
[ Laughs ]
Who let the sea captain write a joke?
For real. In May?
By the way, just to clarify,
the guy who explained that whole insane
bamboo ballot theory doesn't believe it.
As he explained later in the interview.
-So that you feel like -- -That's what they say.
-40,000 ballots have been--?
-Yeah, I don't believe any of that.
I'm just saying that is part of the mystery
that we want to un-gaslight like people about.
And this is a way to do it. -This part of
what you're looking at for it. -I'm not. They are.
-Poor guy. These people are so crazy
that if you explain what they believe,
people think you are crazy. They're crazy, is airborne.
For some reason, it fell to him to explain to the press
what these people are looking for.
It's like coming home from work and trying to calmly explain
to your wife that you're late for dinner
because the guy in the F train pulled the emergency brake
because he thought a cockroach stole his cigarette.
So he claimed, and again, these are his words,
a cockroach came up to him
and asked him for directions to the nearest OTB.
And while he was looking, again his words,
the cockroach reached into his pocket
and stole his Marlboro Light.
I don't know. That's what he said.
[ Deep voice ] Sorry. It's a true story.
I just needed a smoke. I'm a little stressed out.
The Mets can't hit with runners in scoring position.
This cigarette tastes weird, is this bamboo?
Does anyone on the train have that 5k camera?
[ Normal voice ] Anyway, the point is,
this is what the Republican Party has committed itself to.
Most political parties would move on and engage
in some level of introspection and self assessment
after being repeatedly rejected by a majority of voters
and losing power entirely.
They'd also move on from a president
who was both deeply unpopular and left the nation in ruins.
Instead, Republicans are intensifying
their devotion to Trump.
They're in the process right now, pushing
Wyoming Congressman Liz Cheney out of a leadership role
simply because she affirmed the basic reality --
Trump lost the election --
and called the idea that it was stolen from him
a toxic lie that undermines democracy.
And again, as I've said many times now,
I did not want to side with Liz Cheney.
She's not a hero.
She's a pro-war torture apologist
who stood by Trump in 2016
and during his first impeachment trial
and helped build the modern GOP into what it is today.
She's as much to blame for the rise of Trump-ism
as anyone else in Republican leadership.
I don't want to support her any more than I want to
hang out with Jasper T. Jowls.
It's just that now she's being purged
for simply stating the reality that Trump lost
and there was no widespread fraud.
And now Republicans want to replace her
with New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik,
a Trump loyalist who has repeated
his debunked election lies
and said last week on Steve Bannon's podcast
that she supports the nutty Arizona election audit.
-What are your thoughts about what's going on in Arizona?
-I fully support the audit in Arizona.
-We want transparency and answers for the American people.
What are the Democrats so afraid of?
The voters in Arizona and the state Senate in Arizona
pursued this audit. I fully support it.
Transparency is a good thing.
We need to fix these election security issues
going into the future.
-What election security issues? Strands of bamboo on ballots
smuggled in from Asia. What's next?
We're also using a 5k camera
to look for microscopic marinara stains
to make sure no ballots were secretly smuggled in from Italy?
I personally witnessed an Antifa fraudster
sneak into the counting room with a calzone
stuffed with pepperoni and fraudulent ballots.
This is all that matters in today's GOP.
Your willingness to repeat Trump's deranged
lies about the election and codify them
into law through voter suppression bills
that will let Republicans steal the next election.
That's why Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
was on "Fox News" last week signing a voter suppression bill
surrounded by fawning Trump fans.
Over the weekend, GOP Congressman Jim Banks
said he supported Cheney's ouster and essentially accused
her of abandoning Republicans by acknowledging reality.
-Do you still question whether or not Joe Biden
won the election fair and square
and got over 270 electoral votes fair and square?
-Yeah, Chris, I stand by my vote to object on January 6th.
I stand by the Texas lawsuit because I have serious concerns
about how the election in November was was carried out.
-When Liz Cheney says history is watching
and you can't go forward until you resolve this question.
The election was fair and square.
Donald Trump played a negative role.
You think she's misguided making those points?
-Yeah. I've called on Liz Cheney to rejoin the Republican team
and help us go out and win the majority
in the midterm election.
-"I've called Liz Cheney to rejoin
the Republican team to acknowledge
that there are serious concerns about the election
and to admit that we are, in fact, living in The Matrix.
That's why I'm supporting as her replacement Morpheus,
who has made some very persuasive
points about voter fraud. And he knows kung fu.
Learned it in a day." But listen to what he said,
that's actually a fairly shocking admission.
He essentially said Cheney is abandoning
Republicans by acknowledging reality.
Meaning that there are two separate things.
Republicans don't live in reality.
In fact, in order to be a member of this Republican Party,
you have to abandon reality.
It's like insisting to your children
that the guy in the Mickey Mouse costume
is the actual Mickey Mouse.
Even though your kids are now thirty five years old,
"You can either rejoin this family
on our annual trip to Typhoon Lagoon and acknowledge
that Mickey Mouse is a real person.
Or you can get the hell out of here.
And are you smoking another one of those bamboo cigarettes?
Did you steal that from a cockroach?"
[ Deep voice ] Guilty.
[ Normal voice ] Is that as popular a recurring character that we think it is?
Cigarette smoking cockroach?
We'll find out on the old comments.
[ Laughter ]
And even, by the way, we did a full clip
about Donald Trump crashing weddings.
No Vince Vaughn.
That's restraint.
And even Republicans who are no longer in office,
like Chris Christie, are blaming Cheney for her choice
to simply live in reality
rather than Republicans for lying about the election
and dismantling democracy.
-I think Liz is doing what she wants to do.
I don't think Liz wants to be in leadership anymore,
because once she won the vote earlier,
she continued to press this issue publicly
in a way that was antagonizing the people who were against her.
And I think you don't have an entitlement to be in leadership.
-Think about how sad it is
to still be loyal to a guy like Trump
after everything he put Chris Christie through,
among all the other humiliations Christie suffered.
Trump once forced him to eat meat loaf at the White House,
a place where they famously will literally make anything for you.
"Mr. Christie, before you order,
we have the most exquisite culinary creations
you can imagine from a chef
who lives here on the premises."
[ As Trump ] He'll have the meatloaf.
Bring him a side of ketchup.
And Christie is still sticking by Trump.
Maybe that's what you have to do
to keep your job in this Republican Party.
In order to demonstrate your fealty to Trump,
you have to lie about the election
and eat a giant plate of meatloaf on TV
while he insults your wife and your dad
and then, for good measure, kicks you in the balls.
[ As Giuliani ] Don't worry, boss, I'm wearing a cup.
It's great because it doubles as a mask.
[ Normal voice ] Any sane political party would move on from a president
who is both deeply unpopular,
lost by a wide margin, and, on top of everything else,
left nothing but misery and destruction in his wake.
And yet, Republicans are not moving on.
They're doubling down.
There as committed to Trump as ever,
and now they don't care much about how they have to lie
or debase themselves to prove their loyalty to him.
Republicans are looking at Trump's election lies
in their own voter suppression bills and saying --
-You are a great and beautiful couple.
-This has been A Closer Look.
♪♪
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